I've been keeping a list of rules questions over a the last couple of seasons of Encounters as well as a few homes games I'm either running or playing in. I'm hoping that I can get some help clarifying these issues, just so I can get a better grasp on these corner cases that confused me (or the game) so much that it made at least me stop to write them down.

So, first and foremost, I'm really sorry for waiting this long to post, and the stupidly large number of questions I'm putting out there. Second, thank you to anyone who wants to take a quick stab at what I'm sure are simple answers that I've just overcomplicated in my mind. I appreciate it.

The power is a free action, used on success of monster knowledge check (a no action). Can a player make a monster knowledge check as an interrupt, or an opportunity (for example: when an enemy leaves a square adjacent to the player and provoking an AoO, or in response to being attacked be said creature) to gain the bonuses from the power (thus potentially negating a hit, or killing a monster if it's within [Int Mod] hit points of dying after already determining damage initially)?

Using the Chaos Knight as an example, it has an aura 1 that deals damage if you do not include the demon in the attack as a target.

If, for example, a player is flanked by two Chaos Knights, does it get punished by both for not attacking either (a third monster adjacent to it, maybe, that poses a bigger threat)? The source of the damage is two different sources, but it's the same aura. I am unclear on when auras do and don't overlap and negate each other.

When does this trigger? The power says "moves adjacent." If a player is already adjacent to the creature, and moves to another square adjacent to the creature, does this power trigger? Or does it have to be moving into a square adjacent to the Demon, from a square that was not adjacent to the Demon?

This power has the radiant keyword. As I understand it, that makes the whole power "radiant" for purposes of resistance. (Correct me here if I'm wrong, please.)

Say a player has "Resist Radiant 5" and is struck by a Vindicator attack. Does the player resist 1d10+3 and then resist 1d6, or will the player resist 1d10+1d6+3? (Assuming max damage rolls, a player would take 9 damage [13-5 and 6-5], or he'd take 14 [19-5] damage.)

When are resistances applied when an entire power's keyword deals a damage type, and then there's an additional die roll's damage of the same type? And if I've gotten this all backwards, can you please show me an example of each and how it's actually supposed to work?

In this example, a player takes damage, and has a Cleric within 5, and a Paladin within 3. Both of them interrupt: the Cleric with Reverent Mettle (reduce damage by 5+CHA [we'll say 5 here]) and a Paladin with Righteous Shield (Paladin takes the damage of the triggering attack).

If I am correct, the Cleric can reduce the damage by 10, and the Paladin will take (damage-10) without issue? The question I have is if the Cleric's trigger is "an ally takes damage" and that ally is a Ranger, can the Paladin take the reduced damage since the Cleric's interrupt would have vanished -- ie, the Ranger never took damage, therefore it couldn't be reduced before the Paladin took the damage instead? (This would mean that the Cleric could reduce the damage after the Paladin took it, though, so it actually matters what order the power is interrupted in?)

Creature A just dominated the Ranger, and ends its turn. On the Cleric's turn, the Cleric stuns Monster A.

On the Ranger's turn, can Creature A dictate what the Ranger does, since the Ranger is dominated? Or does the Ranger just sit there, doing nothing, since Creature A is stunned?

The dominator doesn't have an action type -- even "no action" -- listed to use the dominate effect. A stunned creature can't take actions, but if exercising dominate doesn't require an action, the stunned creature can still exercise domination over its target, correct?

During one of the last seasons of Encounters, there was a Warlock who Rebuked a creature. The environment (or an ongoing effect) dealt the Warlock damage. Does the Rebuke still trigger off of damage with no source (ie, no target)?

Hyperbole, but it helps illustrate my example: A Warlock is in a barfight and Rebukes the bartender. The Warlock then breaks a glass bottle on the ground and walks over the glass taking 1d4 damage (because broken glass example, that's why). Does the Rebuke go off, damaging the bartender again?

A player is struck dead, to negative bloodied, but also has ongoing effects, we'll say Slowed for this example. On the very next initiative pass, another player administers a Potion of Life (lv 30 consumable, 50HP to an creature that died since the end of your last turn). Does the dead player return with his save-ends effects on him? Any creature brought up from negative hit points still maintains any ongoing effects if they did not previously save against them while unconscious, but negative-bloodied is not exactly the same as unconscious anymore. Do all effects end on perma-death, at negative-bloodied?

Do they? I have it written down, so obviously it confused me at one time... If I'm ducking behind a wall that grants partial cover, and it's misting out (partial concealment), are enemies at -4 to hit me? Almost all the references I'm finding in the compendium online say "cover or concealment" and never mention having both at the same time.

Death Threat lets you assign your Quarry to a target within 5 squares of you, if you reduce your original Quarry target to 0. Does this new enemy have to meet the conditions for Quarry to be designated when Death Threat triggers? For example, say that the Ranger is blinded, or that the enemy is invisible or behind total cover. To designate a target as your Quarry, you must be able to see it -- line of sight. If you cannot see a target to Quarry when Death Threat triggers, can you reassign it at all?

This is a moot point now, as the player took different gear, but I was still wondering what the rules forum thought on this.

A player has a set of gloves that grant certain bonuses, but he wanted to pick up a different set that offered different bonuses and switch them back and forth during combat. The player uses a great bow. Off the top of my head, it would require two free actions (1 to drop the bow, 1 more to flip your hands so the gloves come off), 1 minor to pull the gloves from your belt (like drawing a weapon) and probably 1 more minor to equip them, leaving the player with only the choice of a move or standard, which would mean they couldn't attack and would have potentially wasted a round of combat.

This is just an opinion question, though, since it's not actually applicable anymore.

58286228 wrote:

As a DM, I find it easier to just punish the players no matter what they pick, as I assume they will pick stuff that is broken. I mean, fight after fight they kill all the monsters without getting killed themselves! What sort of a game is this, anyway?

4e was the "modern" D&D, right? The one that had design notes that drew from more modern games, and generally appealed to those who preferred the design priorities of modern games. I'm only speculating, but I'd hazard a guess that those same 4e players are the ones running the wide gamut of other games at Origins.

D&D 4e players are pretty much by definition the players who didn't mind, and often embraced, D&D being "different". That willingness to embrace the different might also mean they are less attached to 4e itself, and are willing to go elsewhere.

This is a brilliant insight. I was thinking along those lines myself.

There are so many tiny indie games that if you added them all together they would definitely rival Pathfinder. If there were a dominant game for those people it would do better but there is no dominant game. Until 4e, the indie people were ignored by the makers of D&D.

Yep. 4E was embraced by the 'system matters' crowd who love analyzing and innovating systems. That crowd had turned its back on D&D as a clunky anachronism. But with 4E, their design values were embraced and validated. 4E was D&D for system-wonks. And with support for 4E pulled, the system-wonks have moved on to other systems. The tropes and traditions of D&D never had much appeal for them anyway. Now there are other systems to learn and study. It's like boardgamegeeks - always a new system on the horizon. Why play an ancient games that's seven years old?

Of course, not all people who play and enjoy 4E fit that mould. I'm running a 4E campaign right now, and my long-time D&D players are enjoying it fine. But with the system-wonks decamping, the 4E players-base lost the wind in its sails.

1. You can use it during an attack, but it can't "Interrupt" and negate things. Only Interrupts can do that, because they say so.

2. Auras "stack" unless they are providing a penalty. Penalty in game terms, so a minus to something. Damage is not a penalty in game terms.

3. Is not adjacent and moves adjacent. Note any kind of movement, including forced movement or teleportation, will qualify.

4/5: Don't want to look up the powers.

6. The creature can still tell the Ranger what to do, because magic (also the rules don't say they can't which is required in 4e).

7. Yes. It says when you take damage. You took damage.

8. Not covered by the rules.

9. They stack.

10. Don't want to look up the exact wording. Normally though SvG applies, if the power says you can quarry, you can quarry.

11. Taking off the gloves would also be a minor. Normally if you want to do something like this it is because of a daily power or some such, just wear those gloves for one combat per day and your "normal" pair the other times, switching out of combat. But yes the suggested idea is a stupid waste of a turn.

WRT 1: There's no strict RAW as to when monster knowledge happens, but I almost always run it as 'the first time the relevant PC sees the relevant monster - so, unless they're getting a surprise round, the monster should always have been subject to scholar theme-ness well before it gets to do anything.

Scholar Utility: Monster Knowledge checks don't actually have a trigger on when you can use them. It's just a "No Action". Granted, yes, it would make sense that they'd have to make them immediately upon sighting the creature, but the rules for monster knowledge do say you're allowed to make new rolls as more information is presented.

Plus, players often forget to make these checks in the heat of the moment, so saying "nope, you didn't say it the instant you saw it, so now you can't" seems like a violation of Wheaton's Law.

Further, in many games, I've seen DM's house rule that you wait until your turn to make checks.

As for Use Vulnerability in response to an attack, nothing about this implies that it has to function like an interrupt to work, so the usual rules for non-triggered actions should apply.

Chaos Knight: as written, you take damage if you don't target a Chaos Knight with an attack. So if you attack one, the other will damage you. If you decide not to attack either, both will damage you.

Note: I wouldn't suggest using creatures that create a Catch-22 like this often. Giving a player no good option in combat is usually a bad thing, as it has little entertainment value- I feel it's ok to let players be punished for making bad choices, but punishing them no matter what choice they make adds little entertainment value to the game.

Rune Spiral Demon: I would say that if you were already adjacent to the demon, moving to another square adjacent to the demon does not trigger this effect.

If the trigger said, instead, "if an enemy moves into an adjacent square" that would allow you to trigger the power in the instance you describe.

Shadowbane's "Vindicator": damage resistance is only applied whe you take damage of that type. If a power natively has a damage keyword- in this case, radiant- it counts as a Radiant attack, but does not necessarily deal Radiant damage to a target (see Blazing Starfall for a similar situation).

For a similar situation, using a whetstone that adds extra damage to an attack. If your attack now deals 2d8 fire damage plus 2 cold, it is a fire and cold attack, but a creature with cold resistance isn't going to resist more than the 2 points of cold damage, nor does the damage become "fire and cold".

Multiple Damage-Negating Interrupts: the triggers and the target lines of the individual powers are important here. Example:

Trigger: an enemy deals damage to an ally Effect: that damage is reduced by X

In this case, it appears the damage of the attack is reduced no matter who took it.

On the other hand;

Trigger: an ally takes damage Target: the triggering ally Effect: that damage is reduced by X

In this case, the power only reduces the damage that ally receives. If that ally does not take the damage, it is not reduced.

Many powers that allow you to take damage for an ally specifically call out that the damage cannot be reduced. So if you were to hit an ally for 20 fire damage, it doesn't matter if that ally has 10 fire resist (because he's not actually taking the damage) and it might not matter if YOU have 10 fire resist, because the power won't allow you to apply it.

Dominate and Stun: by the rules as written, no, nothing requires a dominator to take an action of any kind to dictate what the dominated creature does.

Note, however, that adhering closely to the rules can create a strange precedent for your game, as nothing stops unconscious or (possibly even dead creatures) to control their victims.

Imagine a trap that dominates. Would you be happy if the DM made tactical decisions about the dominated character if there was no actual intelligence directing that character? So this is one instance where it's probably best to discuss this with the group on how you wish to handle things like this, so as not to disrupt immersion.

Hellish Rebuke triggers when you take damage. The source of the damage is not relevant, because the power doesn't make it relevant. You can cite the "bag of rats" rule if the player is basically attacking themselves to trigger their power, but by the rules as written, the power can trigger if an enemy hits you or you put your hand in a fire.

It may make sense to a DM to houserule this to work only if an enemy deals damage to you, but keep in mind two things. One, Warlocks don't often deal damage equal to other Striker classes to begin with, so making it harder for your Hell-lock to keep up with the party Ranger is probably a bad idea.

Two, you start having to split hairs. "Ok, Hellish Rebuke only triggers if an enemy damages you in this game. The enemy slides you into a pit and you take falling damage. Well, the enemy didn't deal the damage, so..."

You probably don't want to encourage that level of "gamism", as it doesn't make for a healthy game.

Ongoing effects: the game rules do not cover this instance specifically. Since in most cases, keeping track of effects that no longer matter is irrelevant, many DM's will stop worrying about a corpse that is taking ongoing damage. However, consider that a corpse is considered to be an object. If an object is taking ongoing fire damage somehow, then what you need to ask yourself is if that is somehow relevant. Could the object be destroyed? If it is relevant, you probably should keep track of it, and still make saving throws against the effect.

If an effect ends when something dies, it does, if not, it doesn't, by the rules as written. So it boils down to how much time you want to spend bookkeeping irrelevant effects...and how much you want to mess with your players.

In earlier editions, for example, raising a poisoned character from the dead could result in the character dying again from the poison when raised. Being a stickler on this point may stray into Wheaton's Law territory, so it's best to discuss it with the group to see how everyone feels about it.

Cover and concealment: consider that two different effects are applying a penalty for different reasons. The rules would allow blind and restrain to stack, so there's no reason to disallow cover and concealment.

However, many forms of cover would, by definition, provide some level of concealment as well, so this has larger ramifications. A guy standing behind a pillar could now be at -4 to hit instead of -2. Or, if it's a big pillar, be at -10 to hit instead of -5! So it's something you should discuss with your group to see how everyone feels about it, since it affects everyone equally.

Death Threat: "Hunter's Quarry" is an effect that can be placed on a creature, no different than being marked or dazed. If you have a power that says "you mark the enemy hit", that has no bearing on another power that says "you mark each enemy adjacent to you".

Thus, while the At-Will power to apply Hunter's Quarry says the enemy must meet certain requirements, it has no bearing on other means to place a Hunter's Quarry on the target.

When applying any condition to a creature, only the actual effect applying the condition matters, unless otherwise stated.

Switching equipment: this is something that could be prone to abuse, but, at the same time, you do have to consider how this impacts players taking "niche" items. A head slot that gives you darkvision is nice, but if you can't switch it out when it becomes relevant, then you have players weighing the value of having darkvision vs. just using cheap sunrods.

If most fights take place in 20' rooms, the sunrods will probably win, as the value of darkvision lowers, and dedicating an item slot to have darkvision all the time becomes a less wise choice.

On the other hand, players may want to exploit combos by swapping out items with powers, so it can really go both ways.

The rules refer to wearing multiple items in the same slot by saying only the last one applied functions. So if you have iron armbands of power, but pick up a Shield of Fellowship, the armbands do nothing until you drop the shield.

There's a high risk of getting into minutiae here, with trying to apply real world logic to whether a helmet is easier to take off than a pair of goggles, or if one can wear a robe over armor, or how difficult it is to take off a ring as opposed to an enchanted wrist razor. This probably isn't healthy for the game, so as I've stated above, it's better to talk over with the group to see how everyone feels about this.

Because it will have an impact on what items are seen as "valuable". If you can't quickly put on goggles of darkvision or trap removal when needed, and dealing with darkness or traps isn't a common occurence, then those items are not going to be valued highly. If you can quickly swap out your gloves that let you reroll damage once per combat for gloves that deal more damage to bloodied enemies, then one or both of those items will be valued higher than normal. /[spoiler]

"You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies." -The Doctor, Remembrance of the Daleks

Yeah, I was thinking about this trap I saw in an LFR mod, a mirror that dominates you if you look at it. I remember thinking to myself "how the heck does a TRAP dominate me, and how does it decide what I do?". A preset command, that I could see, but making tactical decisions seem a bit strange, to say the least.

"You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies." -The Doctor, Remembrance of the Daleks

Well if it IS intelligent, that's fine. Traps aren't usually presented with attributes, though. Not that you have to stat out something like that, I don't think intelligent magic items have attributes (I'd have to check), and if someone wanted to say their magic mirror trap actually has a will, I wouldn't require it- but in absence of any indication that a dominate trap is guided by anyone's will other than the DM, I'd at least question it's ability to make tactical decisions.

The game mechanics obviously don't have to make sense to work, but it helps immersion when they do.

"You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies." -The Doctor, Remembrance of the Daleks

Lol, all I mean is, it's fine if it's presented as being intelligent, like it talks or does something to indicate it has a mind and will of it's own. But if it's just some random trap and it dominates someone, it probably should have some kind of program to determine what it makes the dominated characters do, otherwise it makes the same amount of sense as allowing a dead creature to dictate the actions of a dominated character.

"You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies." -The Doctor, Remembrance of the Daleks

But rather than spend time defining a program (unless you happen to enjoy doing so), you can just decide what it does during the encounter which then becomes what it was programmed to do. Retro-fluffing?

Even dead or unconcious creatures choosing the dominated creatures actions could be justified. Imagine the dominate condition being similar to earlier edition's Geas spell, or Mass Effect's indoctrination - depends a lot on how the power causing the condition is described to begin with, but all fluff is optional...

New one for you, but a hyptothetical. It's an idea I'm toying with, but want to know if there's a precedent.

Players are in the crowd of a packed football stadium. Totally sold out, and it's standing room only for 's one night performance. But, suddenly SOMETHING happens out on the ampitheatre floor, and the players have to get down there and save the band.

Empty stadium seating would probably be difficult terrain, just because of how narrow the lanes in front of seating usually is set up. I've never seen anyone argue with that.

But with a packed crowd, what if it was just, "Moving through any square occupied by an audience member counts as two squares of movement." Not difficult terrain, but two squares.

Does the distinction make sense? Is there any precedent in RAW (or even something sanctioned, like LFR or Encounters) that's established that, "No, it's not difficult terrain, but yes, it still costs 2 squares to move through?"

58286228 wrote:

As a DM, I find it easier to just punish the players no matter what they pick, as I assume they will pick stuff that is broken. I mean, fight after fight they kill all the monsters without getting killed themselves! What sort of a game is this, anyway?

4e was the "modern" D&D, right? The one that had design notes that drew from more modern games, and generally appealed to those who preferred the design priorities of modern games. I'm only speculating, but I'd hazard a guess that those same 4e players are the ones running the wide gamut of other games at Origins.

D&D 4e players are pretty much by definition the players who didn't mind, and often embraced, D&D being "different". That willingness to embrace the different might also mean they are less attached to 4e itself, and are willing to go elsewhere.

This is a brilliant insight. I was thinking along those lines myself.

There are so many tiny indie games that if you added them all together they would definitely rival Pathfinder. If there were a dominant game for those people it would do better but there is no dominant game. Until 4e, the indie people were ignored by the makers of D&D.

Yep. 4E was embraced by the 'system matters' crowd who love analyzing and innovating systems. That crowd had turned its back on D&D as a clunky anachronism. But with 4E, their design values were embraced and validated. 4E was D&D for system-wonks. And with support for 4E pulled, the system-wonks have moved on to other systems. The tropes and traditions of D&D never had much appeal for them anyway. Now there are other systems to learn and study. It's like boardgamegeeks - always a new system on the horizon. Why play an ancient games that's seven years old?

Of course, not all people who play and enjoy 4E fit that mould. I'm running a 4E campaign right now, and my long-time D&D players are enjoying it fine. But with the system-wonks decamping, the 4E players-base lost the wind in its sails.

One thing I've learned about D&D, especially since the 3x days and the democratizing of the game because of the internet... "You're the DM," isn't good enough for players anymore, generally speaking.

Trying to do something "different," or too far beyond RAW tends to provoke grumbles at the very least, and stand-up arguments at their worst, without precedent or policy to back the idea up.

58286228 wrote:

As a DM, I find it easier to just punish the players no matter what they pick, as I assume they will pick stuff that is broken. I mean, fight after fight they kill all the monsters without getting killed themselves! What sort of a game is this, anyway?

4e was the "modern" D&D, right? The one that had design notes that drew from more modern games, and generally appealed to those who preferred the design priorities of modern games. I'm only speculating, but I'd hazard a guess that those same 4e players are the ones running the wide gamut of other games at Origins.

D&D 4e players are pretty much by definition the players who didn't mind, and often embraced, D&D being "different". That willingness to embrace the different might also mean they are less attached to 4e itself, and are willing to go elsewhere.

This is a brilliant insight. I was thinking along those lines myself.

There are so many tiny indie games that if you added them all together they would definitely rival Pathfinder. If there were a dominant game for those people it would do better but there is no dominant game. Until 4e, the indie people were ignored by the makers of D&D.

Yep. 4E was embraced by the 'system matters' crowd who love analyzing and innovating systems. That crowd had turned its back on D&D as a clunky anachronism. But with 4E, their design values were embraced and validated. 4E was D&D for system-wonks. And with support for 4E pulled, the system-wonks have moved on to other systems. The tropes and traditions of D&D never had much appeal for them anyway. Now there are other systems to learn and study. It's like boardgamegeeks - always a new system on the horizon. Why play an ancient games that's seven years old?

Of course, not all people who play and enjoy 4E fit that mould. I'm running a 4E campaign right now, and my long-time D&D players are enjoying it fine. But with the system-wonks decamping, the 4E players-base lost the wind in its sails.

One thing I've learned about D&D, especially since the 3x days and the democratizing of the game because of the internet... "You're the DM," isn't good enough for players anymore, generally speaking.

Trying to do something "different," or too far beyond RAW tends to provoke grumbles at the very least, and stand-up arguments at their worst, without precedent or policy to back the idea up.

I don't think this is due to the internet; it's because D&D has become crunchier over time. Crunchy systems give more powers to players relative to DMs, because players can predict exactly how the rules interact and how their choices will affect play. (See Robin's Laws of Good Gamemastering for more on this.) Thus, in your example, if a player made a lot of choices to obviate difficult terrain, and then you told him that this isn't really difficult terrain but has the same functional effect, I'd think he has legitimate grounds for complaint.

A more extreme example: a player makes his character very difficult to hit, in that he has high defenses. Then a DM creates a monster that doesn't "attack" the character but instead "strikes" the player, where striking is different from attacking in that it doesn't have to overcome defenses and so hits automatically. If I was that player I'd be very frustrated.

Fortunately, I think the distinction between bleachers-as-difficult-terrain and moving-through-a-crowd-as-something-else makes good sense, and there's a perfect game concept, other than difficult terrain, that can apply to moving through a crowd: squeezing. Also, burst / blast effects that target creatures will hit all the bystanders too. (Mwahahaha!)

Is there a table, in RAW, that talks about the distribution of consumables as treasure versus permanent magical items? I'd like to include some as part of the "magic item of level x+y," but I don't want the response to be, "That sucked. They're consumables."

58286228 wrote:

As a DM, I find it easier to just punish the players no matter what they pick, as I assume they will pick stuff that is broken. I mean, fight after fight they kill all the monsters without getting killed themselves! What sort of a game is this, anyway?

4e was the "modern" D&D, right? The one that had design notes that drew from more modern games, and generally appealed to those who preferred the design priorities of modern games. I'm only speculating, but I'd hazard a guess that those same 4e players are the ones running the wide gamut of other games at Origins.

D&D 4e players are pretty much by definition the players who didn't mind, and often embraced, D&D being "different". That willingness to embrace the different might also mean they are less attached to 4e itself, and are willing to go elsewhere.

This is a brilliant insight. I was thinking along those lines myself.

There are so many tiny indie games that if you added them all together they would definitely rival Pathfinder. If there were a dominant game for those people it would do better but there is no dominant game. Until 4e, the indie people were ignored by the makers of D&D.

Yep. 4E was embraced by the 'system matters' crowd who love analyzing and innovating systems. That crowd had turned its back on D&D as a clunky anachronism. But with 4E, their design values were embraced and validated. 4E was D&D for system-wonks. And with support for 4E pulled, the system-wonks have moved on to other systems. The tropes and traditions of D&D never had much appeal for them anyway. Now there are other systems to learn and study. It's like boardgamegeeks - always a new system on the horizon. Why play an ancient games that's seven years old?

Of course, not all people who play and enjoy 4E fit that mould. I'm running a 4E campaign right now, and my long-time D&D players are enjoying it fine. But with the system-wonks decamping, the 4E players-base lost the wind in its sails.

Is there a table, in RAW, that talks about the distribution of consumables as treasure versus permanent magical items? I'd like to include some as part of the "magic item of level x+y," but I don't want the response to be, "That sucked. They're consumables."

you could just reduce the amount of gold by the value of the consumable

Is there a table, in RAW, that talks about the distribution of consumables as treasure versus permanent magical items? I'd like to include some as part of the "magic item of level x+y," but I don't want the response to be, "That sucked. They're consumables."

The DMG treasure parcels (pages 126-129) already include an option for consumables.